Barry Marcus calls the Tories on their involvement with the far-right European Conservative and Reformist Group and its dodgy Polish chair Michal Kaminski. Via JC/Guardian. More from Raincoat Optimist: 1,2,3.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

I was very pleased to be included in Carl Packman's nominations for the Total Politics Top 100 thing, which you should go and vote (for me) in post-haste and certainly before midnight tomorrow, the voting deadline. I'm in good company in his list. Well, I'd rather not share space with the King of Blogging himself, but he's obviously premier league, other are most of Carl's other suggestions, so that's nice. I'm not telling you who I voted for (apart from myself obviously).

Sunny Hundal has contributed a large number of posts in defence of Hasan at Pickled Politics and Liberal Conspiracy. Some of his criticisms of the Harryists are justified, but I don't think that Sunny has taken on the core substantive issues at stake, i.e. Hasan's very reprehensible views.

As Ms Flesh says, there is an issue with anti-Muslim racism, which is a huge problem in our society today. You can see examples of anti-Muslim racism in some comment threads at Harry's Place, and some posters make rather large generalisations that sail close to the wind (I call this problem Harryism). However, none of the posts on Hasan seem to me to have any anti-Muslim racism in them.

Nor, to my mind, is there a witch-hunt or smear campaign against Hasan. One single post at HP taking issue with his dishonest article accusing the mainstream media of anti-Muslim racism was met by Hasan with an ignorant, vitriolic response, and that is why it became interesting to look at his politics and find some unsavoury things. Myself, I am not too interested in the extracts from his speeches on religion that HP are posting. I am more interested in what he says in the New Statesman and Guardian, where he touches mainstream opinion, where he has some kind of authority as "representing" some kind of Muslim view - but where he actually pushes some very unpleasant lines.

UPDATE II:

I just noticed Hasan's reply to HP here. He makes a strong case that he is not an Islamist. To be clear, I myself have not described him as an Islamist. I have described him as an apologist or fellow traveller with the brutal theocracy in Iran and of the Taliban, both of whose main victims are Muslim. I have described him as someone that passes on crypto-fascist conspiracy theory. I have taken issue with the way he defamed the Quilliam Foundation and essentialised "the" Muslim community. I have described him as someone who takes an objectively racist view in saynig Israel "causes" antisemitism.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Jim has given me five words to say something about. Anti-fascism, Brockley, secularism, immigration and iconoclast

Anti-fascismAnti-fascism is at the core of my political being. The first political activism I was involved in, as a 15 year old, was action against the NF. Almost everything else about my politics has changed, but that has remained constant. What has changed, of course, is fascism. The classic Nazi-style fascism of the NF is no longer much of an issue (although extreme right violence remains a threat in the US and UK, and classic neo-Nazis are a major issue in parts of Central and Eastern Europe). The two mutations of fascism that are most important to combat now are, first, the rising forms of Euro-nationalist populism that are predicated on a generalised anti-immigrant racism as well as anti-Muslim racism, a movement that has been growing electorally across Western Europe, and, second, the rising forms of Islamist fascism which have had such a destructive effect on so many parts of the world.

BrockleyContrary to the “from” in my blogonym, I am not native to London SE4. I came here first to visit a friend when the Breakspears Arms was still open, and still reportedly the hub of drug-related crimes that gave the area a less than safe reputation. However, I immediately liked the laid-back, unpretentious, live-and-let-live bohemian feel. I moved here a year or so after that, and have lived in a few different parts of the manor. I think of Brockley as a microcosm of London itself in that it is made up of a series of micro-villages (Brockley Cross, the conservation area, Honor Oak, Crofton Park, and so on), each shading almost imperceptibly into the townships that surround it (Nunhead, St Johns, Ladywell, and so on). That is, I have a conception of a Greater Brockley, rather than the narrow Hillyfields-centric view of the posh types. But an inclusive confederalist Greater Brockley, in the tradition of the Austro-Marxists or Tito, rather than an irredentist Milosevic style Greater Brockley. Good things in Greater Brockley: the wealth of parks and green spaces, the Brockley leyline (ask Transpontine), the standing stones, the paint shop, the Babur, the open studio day every summer...

SecularismI am very much a secularist, in that I believe in a public sphere in which no one faith has privileged access, in which all faiths and none are tolerated. The cleresy, in its various forms, has been the primary enemy of freedom in most of the eras of history, because fundamental to freedom in general is the freedom to imagine, to think and above all to doubt, secular values I hold dear. At the same time, I do not have time for the fossilised nineteenth century forms of secularism which have been so fashionable again of late as a backlash against the apparent halt of our society’s modern secular drift, forms of secularism particularly popular amongst the bloggers to whom I am in most ways the closest. This sort of secularism – secularism as anti-religion – misses, it seems to me, what faith has to offer our world. This offering is exemplified by language of the King James Bible which permeates the speeches of Martin Luther King and the writings of WEB Du Bois. It is exemplified by the music of Mehdi Hassan and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Sam Cooke. It is exemplified in the sanctuary movement in the US and by the Strangers into Citizens and Living Wage movements in the UK. I could go on... Or maybe, as Will puts it, I’m soft on god.

ImmigrationI come from immigrant stock. On my father’s side, Irish labour migrants to the UK (according to my non-Irish grandmother, I have her mother-in-law’s blue Irish eyes). On my mother’s side, Jewish immigrants to the US, occupying that blurry line between “economic migrant” and “refugee” that makes the two terms unstable, as “economic migrant” does not do justice to the need to escape an unbearable life, while “refugee” has not generally been recognised as including the likes of them by the states who shape its meaning. This may be partly why I am so passionately part of the pro-immigration lobby, but then all humans are ultimately of migrant stock and I think to be truly a humanist is to be pro-immigration.

IconoclastI can’t remember if it was in an interview, or told to me by a friend who used to hang out in the Sniffing Glue/Bromley Contingent scene, but apparently when Elvis died in 1977, Danny Baker got very upset at his fellow punks’ wilful delight in this tragedy. I think I have something of Danny Baker’s (probably unhealthy) aversion to iconoclasm. As well as being soft on god, I am soft on places of worship and soft on those considered (by me) to be “great”, like Elvis, or BB King, say, or Hank Williams.

I didn’t mean to write as much as that. Don’t feel you have to if you want to play this game. The rules (at least as Jim and Stroppy played) is that you just ask in the comments below, and I’ll give you five words of your own. If you’re not a blogger, feel free to ask and put your paras in the comments. If you’re one of my regular blog acquaintances, I’ve already thought up some of your words.

Monday, July 20, 2009

It's true, that Lewisham (with a few Greenwich interlopers such as 853.com and Tory Troll) has a pretty lively blogosphere. Even Time Out acknowledged this recently and they normally ignore south of the river entirely, unless they want to do smthg on gangs or a feature on where the next Dalston/Shoreditch is.

Maybe it is some kind of gritty south-east London determination in the face of snide remarks from north Londoners and sectors of the media that spurs us on to prove there's more to south-east London than not having many tube lines!

Back in March 2006, when I started Green Ladywell, the number of local bloggers was fairly small, with Transpontine, (former) Labour councillor Andrew Brown, Bob from Brockley, Lib Dem councillor Andrew Milton and the Man from Catford being the stalwarts of the (male-dominated) blogosphere. Things definitely took off when Brockley Central joined the foray in February 2007 and it seemed to develop a huge online community around it within a few weeks. A few other women bloggers such as Deptford Dame and Brockley Kate (part of the Brockley Central team) came along, although women are still notably in the minority amongst bloggers.

The other thing that was good were the occasional Lewisham bloggers meet ups (initiated by Andrew Brown) and then the Brockley Central drinks, which were a great opportunity to put faces and names to previously anonymous bloggers.

Second, I see from David Semple that the polling for the Total Politics top blogs have opened. You can vote by emailing toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com with your top ten: rules can be found here. Dave comes close to endorsing me.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

This has been sitting in my drafts for over a month now. Rosie tagged me with this thing, where all you have to do is

List 7 things I love

Tag 7 other people

So, here we go:

1. My family.

2. Relaxing. Ideally on a beach, with an unbroken blue sky, a light breeze, facing West into a perfect blue ocean, perhaps the Indian Ocean...

3. A really good book. Something that transports you from wherever you are to somewhere special.

4. Children being happy.

5. Good music.

6. Good food. Ideally eaten outdoors. Ideally eaten outdoors in a Southern European country. Ideally with something chilled and alcoholic to wash it down with. I'm thinking Carne de Porco à Alentejana (ultra-treyf, I know) with some ice cold Sagres.

Books demonising Israel are two a penny, attacking Israelis is a pet hobby of many ex-public school boys and the British intelligentsia. It is a very contemptible practice but as many historians have argued the middle classes are more susceptible to Judenhass.

Democracy promotion: I radically disagree with the TNC's analysis of Honduras, but the first half of this post is an excellent history and defence of the internationalist politics associated with neoconservatism. On the Obama doctrine, the Brockleyite jury is still out.Liberal Israel-haters:Eric Lee with War on Want.

Item: Here Hasan argues that going on Press TV is a good thing, because it can "help foster much-needed dialogue and debate between the west and the Middle East". He argues this by (rightly) pointing out the hypocrisy of the likes of Rod Liddle and Dominic Lawson attacking “Iran’s British stooges”, but fails to address the substantive point that propping up a totalitarian regime's propoganda machine can never be right.

Item: Here he claims that the Quilliam Foundation think that using the term "the Muslim world" is "a phrase conceived exclusively by radical Islamists for nefarious propaganda purposes", when in fact they say nothing of the kind, but sensibly call for a stop to constructing an imaginary homogenous Muslim "community", not least because that kind of homogenising view plays into an anti-Muslim racist "clash of civilizations" worldview.

Item: Here he says that Obama's Cairo speech won't stop "the Muslim world" from hating America, only stopping its support of Israel and, er, of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states, will they stop. In this article, he quotes as an authority one Michael Scheuer, Ron Paul's foreign policy adviser, who recently called for Osama bin Laden to nuke America ("The only chance we have as a country right now"). Here, Scheuer is returning a favour; Bin Laden once said ""If you want to understand what's going on and if you would like to get to know some of the reasons for your losing the war against us, then read the book of Michael Scheuer in this regard." Scheuer is also, unsurprisingly, part of the Walt and Mearsheimer "Israel Lobby" conspiracy theory fantast world:

GARY ROSEN:If you could just elaborate a little bit on the clandestine ways in which Israel and presumably Jews have managed to so control debate over this fundamental foreign policy question.
SCHEUER: Well, the clandestine aspect is that, clearly, the ability to influence the Congress—that’s a clandestine activity, a covert activity. You know to some extent, the idea that the Holocaust Museum here in our country is another great ability to somehow make people feel guilty about being the people who did the most to try to end the Holocaust. I find—I just find the whole debate in the United States unbearably restricted with the inability to factually discuss what goes on between our two countries.[source]

I'm thinking of setting up a sub-blog devoted entirely to Woody Guthrie's song variously known as "Deportees", "Deportee" and "Plane Wreck At Los Gatos". On Wednesday I re-posted this, with Christy Moore's version (be sure to read the Martin M post that inspired it).

... or maybe don't waste real Americana on people who can't appreciate it.

From the early 60's, a Chicano family's filmed reunion on an uncle's property just a few miles from the Los Gatos plane crash. Read the "more info" link and watch the clip until the end. Very touching. And the Bonillas look like a beautiful family

****

Christy Moore gives an entirely Irish-sounding approach to the song to the point where it sounds like an Irish song. He misses completely the Mexican feel of the chorus. Also, he did not, apparently, trouble himself to learn how to pronounce a few simple Spanish words -- MIS amigos ... JESUS y Maria ... He sounds very weird to an American ear. Imagine not knowing how to pronounce JESUS (Hay-soos).

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Coronation Street star Julie Hesmondhalgh was among friends and family who remembered a radical-left Manchester Jewish campaigner whose book spurred MP John Mann to chair the Parliamentary Committee against Antisemitism.

Steve Cohen, who died in March, described himself politically as a “dangerous Jew”. An immigration-law barrister from Prestwich, he set up the Greater Manchester Immigration Aid Unit, fighting legal battles for asylum seekers.

Historian Bill Williams recalled him as a highly controversial character. “The immigrant community have lost a fearless campaigner and we have lost an anti-racism campaigner,” Mr Williams said after the memorial meeting.

Its reappearance on the website of anti-boycott group Engage prompted Mr Mann to comment: “Steve was a great man. His book is responsible for my preparedness to take on the All- Party Parliamentary Committee on Antisemitism work.”

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

This is a re-post, as I discovered that the key link was missing, and an e-mail pointing this out to me was languishing in my spam folder for months. I've removed the most out of date content. The rest remains.

I have nearly half a dozen versions on the computer I'm typing this on, and a couple more on vinyl at my mum and dad's house. Some of the best are Cisco Houston, Bruce Springsteen, Barbara Danes and Arlo Guthrie. Although I was exposed to Woody Guthrie at a young age (folkie Communist fellow travelling family), the first version I heard, as a teenager, was that on The Byrds' Ballad of Easy Rider, one of the best albums ever. It was made after Gene Clark (whose version featured in this post).

Monday, July 13, 2009

Another from Left Luggage: Debating anti-fascist strategy (a round up of left bloggery on the BNP, "no platform" and UAF and Hope Not Hate). Includes link to Dave Osler on the BNP, the white working class and the racism of desperation. Osler's views are echoed here by Bob Morris.

Thursday, July 09, 2009

The 10th anniversary of the student uprising in Iran. The student protests in 1999 spread to 19 cities and went on for 6 days. The uprising was brutally crushed but it was the beginning of a new dawn. It gave us hope that change was coming to Iran. That despite all the propaganda machinery of those who consider themselves the 'Representatives of God on earth', the young Iranians had not been duped, and they had not given up. They were as determined as ever to bring about the 100 year old struggle of the Iranian people for democracy and freedom of speech to fruition.

'Freedom of Thought, Forever, Forever' Was the main slogan of those youngsters who had risked their lives by joining the protests in 1999. Ten years on now, the struggle is much more widespread. Now its every section of the Iranian population. The people of Iran deserve your international support.

Come and join us outside the Islamic Republic embassy in London, tomorrow 9th July, in London after 5:30 pm. Let the forces of darkness know that the freedom loving people of Iran are not on their own.

See you tomorrow at:
16 Prince’s Gate, SW7. The nearest Tube station is South Kensington.

Victory to the freedom loving people of Iran.

Help them enjoy the same freedoms you enjoy.

In Britain, Iran Solidarity is being launched next week. Their declaration and signatories are here. The declaration begins like this:

In June 2009 millions of people came out on to the streets of Iran for freedom and an end to the Islamic regime. Whilst the June 12 election was a pretext for the protests - elections have never been free or fair in Iran – it has opened the space for people to come to the fore with their own slogans.

The world has been encouraged by the protestors’ bravery and humane demands and horrified by the all-out repression they have faced. It has seen a different image of Iran - one of a population that refuses to kneel even after 30 years of living under Islamic rule.

The dawn that this movement heralds for us across the world is a promising one – one that aims to bring Iran into the 21st century and break the back of the political Islamic movement internationally.

I don't want the below to detract from the above, but I think it is important to keep on maintaining clarity about the political battle about solidarity for Iran, and continuing to combat those on the left and right who seek to defuse our solidarity. The violence in Xinjiang province is an instructive case study in solidarity. On the one hand, the Islamist groups (rightly) calling for solidarity with the Uighar people neglect the (mainly Muslim) oppressed of Iran. On the other hand, leftists remain silent and confused about Xingjiang. As Voltaire's Priest notes, "One could safely assume that there would be far more banner headlines if the oppressor state involved was the USA. But, as with certain bloggers’ treatment of the inspiring protests in Iran, for some on the left a state’s opposition to the Great Satan trumps the blood of the working class as a cause for support and solidarity."

Similarly, the coup in Honduras is already amassing more column inches on the American left than the crushing of the uprising in Iran. I flicked over to CounterPunch (strapline: "Tells the facts, names the names") and scan through three days worth of posts. Two articles on Honduras, only one on Iran. Ah, but the article on Iran is not actually about Iran. Iran is pretext to talk about Israel and the Israel Lobby. (Same period: six articles on Israel.) Common Dreams? Three articles on Honduras, none on Iran. ZNet? Four on Honduras, none on Iran. Over here, Socialist Unity?* Two on Honduras, none on Iran.

Dear The Left,
Our last two puppies died for some reason.
Can we have another one? We promise we’ll look after it and feed it and walk it and take care of it and love it for ever and ever and ever and ever and ever!
Awwwwww, pleeeeeeeeeeeease?
Yours,
The SWP

Friday, July 03, 2009

It is London Pride tomorrow, or Pride London as it has been re-branded in this topsy turvy world. In honour of that, we give you this guest post by Jogo.

This is droll.The drollest thing about it is, what makes everybody think that a pink cowboy hat is gay? Can you imagine Hart Crane or André Gide wearing a pink cowboy hat?

Boris is making himself look like an idiot so that the silly queens in this parade think he is cool.

This is thought to be progress. In what sense?I don't think it's progress. Progress would be more people reading Gide.

Here is one more example of the stupidity and profound insecurity of the PC majority-class (white, say; straight, say) of person. They will swallow any shit that a black/gay/whatever "other" hands to them on a plate. Or even that he throws at them.

Go ahead, Boris you schmuck. Show us how pro-gay you are. Put that hat on.

Talking of antisemitism and conspiracy theory, remember Nick Kollerstrom? He's popped up again, at Conway Hall, redoubt of the bearded left, reports Johnny Void, who later, you'll be happy to hear, reports the event's cancellation. However, the meeting happened anyway, in a rather bizarre form, as an intrepid Indymedia reporter reports.

And talking of old friends like Nicholas Kollerstrom, remember Red-Pink Nadine Nadine Rosa-Rosso? Well, Habibi reports that she is back in London, sharing a stage with a number of representatives of murderous theocratic paramilitary outfits - a “Hezbollah representative” and Djab Abou Jahjah via video link from Lebanon [and] Azzam “Kaboom” Tamimi, as well as John Rees of the “Stop the War Coalition”. I'm embarrassed to admit this, but even I thought John Rees had more sense... And here's another old friend: Michelle Renouf.

But what's this in the Yellow Area? The new Peace Justice and Solidarity Marquee, according to an e-mail in my inbox, will be "a great chance to hear about progressve campaigns in the area." A screening of Who Shot the Sheriff?, a quite good SWP propoganda job telling the story of Rock Against Racism, well worth a watch if you've not seen it. Film Reel News reports on Visteon and Waterford Glass factory occupations and Justice for Ian Tomlinson campaign - might be good. Local folk singer Jim Radford - I've never heard him, but am told he's quite a character. Oh, and a staging of Caryl Churchill's Seven Jewish Children (or, as this pro-"peace" website bizarrely calls it, Seven Jewish Women.

If you don't know what Seven Jewish Children is, read this, this, this, or this.

Thursday, July 02, 2009

Just a quick Iran post today. Via Paul Stott, I came across Anonymous Iran, a notice board created, apparently, by the folks who brought us Pirate Bay. A lot of the stuff, posted by anonymous folks, is pure rubbish, gossip, panic, conspiracy, etc. Key posts are kept sticky at the top of each section. There are useful sections on keeping internet anonymity in Iran, on protest advice, and on missing persons. And there is a news section, with a news feed from the mainstream press and, more important, the Green Brief, Josh Shahryar's summary of carefully selected Twitter feeds. Here is yesterday's Green Brief, no.15, and here is well-informed blogger Scott Lucas reporting on how much of the Green Brief can be verified, and here are Lucas' own reports. To summarise all these reports, the uprising is continuing, violent repression is deepening, reports of mass summary executions are probably false.